Cathe Olson, author of "Simply Natural Baby Food, "The Vegetarian Mother's Cookbook," and "Lick It! Creamy Dreamy Vegan Ice Creams Your Mouth Will Love" keeps you up to date on food politics, whole foods and nutrition, as well as sharing recipes and posting book reviews. Also see her web site at http://www.simplynaturalbooks.com

Monday, September 25, 2006

Recently, I've been trying recipes from "More Great Good Dairy-Free Desserts - Naturally" by nutritionist, pastry-chef and cooking teacher Fran Pierson. This book is completely vegan and most recipes contain some whole grain ingredients and less refined sweeteners.

The first chapter - Getting Started - contains helpful information about baking without dairy products and using natural sweeteners. I especially liked the "Tips and Techniques for Making and Baking Desserts" and "A Baker's Dozen Secrets to Successful Desserts." I also like that Costigan recommends using organic ingredients.

The rest of the book is devoted to recipes. I particulary enjoyed the information, advice and tips at the beginning of each section.

- Great Good Gels, Creams, Puddings, and Sauces- Great Good Cookies, Bars, and Little Bites- Great Good Cobblers, Crisps, Biscuits, Muffins, and More- Great Good Cakes, Fillings, Frostings, and Glazes- Great Good Pies and Tarts- Great Good Fruit, Beverages, Frozen Desserts, and Confections

Here are my experiences with the recipes I tried:

Oat Sesame Squares (wheat free)

These are pretty much sweetened crackers made with oat flour, sesame seeds, some oil and maple syrup. I found the dough a bit dry so had to add about a tablespoon of water to get it to hold together.

These squares were really delicious - crispy, great flavor. These were one of my favorite recipes from the book and probably the only one I didn't have to cut down the sweetener in.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I was disapppointed in these. They seemed kind of dry and cardboardy. I think they needed more oats and maybe more oil. They also made a very small batch. I wouldn't make them again.

Peanut Butter Cookies

These were very good. I cut the sugar down from 3/4 cup to 1/2 cup and replaced the white flour with whole wheat. Yummy.

Cornbread

I found this a little sweet - very light though. My family loved it.

Banana Currant Walnut Cornmeal Pancakes

Not sure how pancakes fit into a dessert cookbook but we tried it just the same. They were light and yummy - I would cut the sweetener down to 1 tablespoon next time.

Banana Walnut Bread

Very light even though I replaced the white flour with whole wheat. I cut the sweetener in half and it was still plenty sweet. Great as muffins.

Currant Scones

Excellent! - Even with replacing the white flour with whole wheat, they were light and puffed up nicely. I reduced the sugar dramtically - to 2 tablespoons and they were perfectly sweet. Also - didn't have currants so used dried cranberries which worked out fine.

Also - a couple of other changes. Since I decided in the morning, I was in a scone mood - the prep steps to this are very long and my kids were not about to wait 2 hours for their breakfast so rather than putting canola oil in the freezer for 45 minutes - I used Earth Balance that I already had refrigerated. However, the dough came out way too dry so I had to add quite a bit more rice milk until the dough would hold together. Then you are supposed to let that dough sit in the refrigerator for 30 minutes for gluten to relax. I put it in the freezer for 10 minutes.

Anyway - they came out great - definitely one of my favorites.

Coconut Sorbet

Wow was this good ! (with a little tweaking)

When I use my ice cream maker - I need at least 3 cups of liquid to get a good batch. This recipes called for 1 cup soy milk and 1 cup coconut milk. I used an entire 14 oz. can coconut milk (about 1 3/4 cups) and 1 cups soy milk (which I will increase to 1 1/4 next time).

Also - to save time and dish washing, I toasted the coconut in the pan (rather than oven roasting) before adding the recipes of the ingredients which worked great. I also reduced the light sugar to 1/2 cup and omitted the dark sugar entirely and it was still very sweet.

This was so good - rich and creamy with lots of roasted coconut. I will definitely be making this one often.

Comments:

A couple of things that bothered me with this book:

- The recipe format: The ingredients are listed in a column on the left and the instructions to the right - fine if the recipe fits on one page (which it rarely does.) So when it continued, for some reason, there'd be a short list of ingredients on the first page and I'd say - great I have all that stuff and then I'd get to the next page and there'd be this long list - often twice as long - of all the rest of the ingredients. And I kept falling for it every time - maybe it's just me but that drove me crazy.

- Many of the recipes call for 1/4 juice. I don't normally buy juice - we don't drink it - and I only bake a few times a month - so I don't want to buy a bottle of juice to just use 1/4 cup. It seems such a small amount - does the recipe really need it? Can I just use water?

- Many of the recipes are very time consuming to make (like the scone thing) - with all these added steps. I think I would have tried more recipes if I didn't have to freeze canola oil first (what about coconut oil - would that work?) or make prune purree or toast a bunch of stuff. Once in a while, I don't mind a complicated recipe that I have to plan for but usually I just want something on the spur of the moment to make with the kids.

Also - what's with the pictures? The" Strawberry Shortcakes" are filled with raspberries, the "Super Fudge Low Fat Brownie" has frosting on it which is not in the recipe.

Conclusion:

I think this cookbook is great if you want vegan desserts that taste just like regular very sweet desserts that you'd get at a bakery or bake from a regular non-vegan cookbook. The baked goods are much lighter and sweeter than typical whole-grain baked goods. You could defintitely make these recipes for your non-vegan, non health food eating company without pride.